A day in the park
by just delete this account
Summary: In which Sean and Alex are babies who meet under the slide one fine afternoon.


It was a fine summer's day in New York and Charles Xavier was out on his daily walk in the park with his 2 and a half year old son Sean.

Little Sean was gurgling happily in his stroller, bright auburn hair looking like curling flames on his head in the late afternoon sun. He was playing with his favourite stuffed animal, a plump orange fish, holding on to it's fin and waving it back and forth in front of his face. He inadvertently hits himself with it and when he does, Charles chuckles and reaches down to ruffle his hair.

Sean looks up at him with huge blue eyes, a smile blossoming on his little lips. Charles reaches down and strokes his freckled cheek. "Aren't you just happy today? Be careful with fishy Sean, don't wave him around or he could fly off and land in the dirt."

Sean just coos happily and hugs the fish to himself.

Charles smiles and looks up to find that they've arrived at the little play ground that Sean loves to run around in.

"Oh, here we are." Charles says, walking in front of the stroller and lifting Sean out of it. Sean croons and starts wriggling in excitement as soon as he lays his eyes on the playground. Charles smiles and gently lowers him down to the ground, teasing him for a while by letting his tiny feet hover a few inches above the ground. Sean giggles and lets out a whine, clutching at Charles' hands around his torso and simultaneously kicking his legs back and forth.

Charles puts him down and as soon as he was on his feet, he runs to the slide, tripping once on his way there.

"Careful dear," Charles calls out, casually shoving his hands in his pockets as he watches Sean hurriedly make his way under the slide, his favourite hang out.

Little Sean ignores his father's call completely and runs full speed under his little plastic sanctuary, where he likes to pretend that the huge red thingie slanting down above his head was a roof and he was in his own little house. He loves that place, there he pretends no one can see him and he can do whatever he wants like smear dirt on his clothes or his hair or his face or even fishy. He can blow spit bubbles and pick stuff up from the ground and daddy wouldn't stop him.

He rushes to that place now, impatient for all the fun it could give him and stops short, blinking curiously when he gets there.

Someone was already there, in his space.

Sean pauses, tucking fishy in one arm as he stares down at the other toddler, sitting cross legged on the ground, picking at stray bits of grass with tiny stubby-fingered fists. It was a little boy, just like him. He had short, spiky hair, it was a lot lighter than his own and when Sean paused, the other little boy looked up at him with eyes that were almost as blue as his daddy's.

Out beyond the slide, Charles raises his eyebrows curiously and leans forward a bit to watch how Sean would deal with the child he found.

Two pairs of large blue eyes meet and stare, unblinkingly at each other for a few seconds.

The boy sitting on the ground blinked. Sean blinked back.

Then without warning, Sean runs towards the boy and pushes him, knocking him sideways onto the dirt.

Charles' jaw drops and he opens his mouth to reprimand Sean but before he can, the little blond boy he knocked down gets up and smacks his small palm soundly in the middle of Sean's forehead with a tiny little irritated cry, as if waging a baby war.

Sean's face wrinkles and he scrunches his eyes shut as he begins to wail, arms going limp by his sides, his little stuffed fish falling to the ground.

Charles immediately walks over and almost bumps into a handsome green-eyed man who suddenly dashed out of nowhere and stopped next to the slide too. The man barely acknowledges him, eyes focused intently on the small blond child now blankly staring at Sean as he bawled. He glared at the little boy and crossed his arms.

"Alex what did you do _this _time?" he asks sternly

The boy, Alex just blinks, crosses his arms across his little chest and pouts, looking at anywhere but the green-eyed man who sighs and rolls his eyes.

Charles coughs politely to get his attention. "I'm sorry, is that your son?"

The green-eyed man turns to him. "Yes and I think he just threw dirt in yours' face or some other equally stupid thing that he should _apologize_ for." He says, looking down sternly at Alex again. Alex just continues to ignore him.

Charles opens his mouth to say something but doesn't get to when Sean runs over and wraps his arms around his knees, continuing to bawl as he buries his face in the soft, expensive fabric of Charles' slacks. Charles reaches down and picks him up, wiping his tears with the palm of his hand. "There, there. It's alright." He hushes him softly.

The green-eyed man crouches down in front of Alex. "Alexander Summers, I know you're guilty, apologize. Right now."

Alex still continues to ignore him, little blond eyebrows furrowing into a glare over his eyes.

His father sighs again and stands up, turning to Charles. "I'm sorry, he's a very stubborn child and I'm still working on trying to fix his manners."

Charles chuckles briefly. "It's alright he's only about 2 correct? He looks to be Sean's age." He says, gesturing to Sean with a nod of his head.

Alex's father shakes his head. "Close, he's one and a half."

Sean pauses in his wailing to look at Chares and point down at Alex accusingly, sniffling pitifully as he does so. He mumbles out some toddler gibberish that Charles has no problem understanding as _he did it_.

Charles just shakes his head and pulls out a small plastic case from his pocket. "You pushed him down first sweetheart, I saw you." He says, taking out a pacifier from the case and gently putting it in Sean's mouth so he can calm down. It was easier to make him listen when he was calm.

Sean automatically begins to suck on the pacifier and sniffles again.

Alex's father's eyebrows furrow in confusion. "Wait, he did?"

Charles nods at him. "I don't blame your boy for fighting back and hitting Sean on the head, Sean very rudely" he pauses to raise a reprimanding eyebrow at Sean. "Pushed him down when he was just sitting there, doing nothing."

"Oh…well that's a first, usually he's the one who starts trouble."

Charles smiles. "I see."

Alex's father crouches down in front of him again. "Alright Alex, I'm sorry. But you still need to apologize for hitting him." He says, pointing at Sean.

To everyone's surprise, Alex glances(more like glares) up at Sean, stares at him for a few seconds then his eyes slowly began to water and he started crying.

"Oh dear," Charles says, watching as Alex lets his hands drop limply to his sides and tilts his head back slightly, beginning to wail much like Sean did.

His father picks him up and starts bouncing him up and down. "Oh c'mmon, it's alright. I've asked you to apologize a billion times before, why are you being all fussy about it now?"

Charles eyes him with a curious smile, recognizing that he was very new to parenting. He turns to Sean who was still sniffling but otherwise had stopped crying. "Sean," he begins in that "I expect you to do the right thing young man" tone that he uses every time Sean does something wrong and he was trying to get him to own up to it.

"You know you're wrong too and if you want him to apologize, you have to do it first."

Charles says, looking him straight in the eye, blue to blue. Sean just sniffles again but Charles cautiously puts him down and gently nudges him toward Alex and his dad.

"Go on, do what you have to do." Charles says.

Sean takes small, hesitant steps forward and when he reaches his destination, Alex's father lowers him to the ground and sets him down in front of Sean. Alex continues to cry but he peers at Sean through teary eyes.

The two adults present watched with bated breath as their sons stared at each other.

Charles smiles, when as he expected, Sean made the first move and softly patted Alex on the shoulder.

"You can do better than that. Give him a hug, go on." Charles says, encouraging Sean who looks back at him and does as he says, dropping fishy to the ground and wrapping skinny little arms around Alex's neck.

Charles beams at the adorableness of it all and exchanges a glance with Alex's father when Alex's wailing slowly simmers down into dry sobs and sniffles.

Sean lets him go and pats him gently on the head.

"Alright Alex, your turn." His father prompts.

Then, surprising everyone yet _again_, Alex looks up at Sean and still sniffling, he yanks the pacifier out of his mouth and causes their father's eyebrows to disappear into their hairlines when he leans forward and pecks him on the mouth.

"Well…that's a little…a _lot_ actually, different than normal." Alex's father comments, blinking in confusion as Alex bends down to pick up Sean's stuffed fish and hands it back to him. Sean takes it happily and hugs it tight.

"Well, I guess it's safe to say our sons are now friends." Charles says, smiling up at Alex's father and holding out a hand. "Charles Xavier."

Alex's father takes his hand and shakes it. "Erik Lensherr."

Both of them look down when they hear Sean spewing more toddler gibberish and find him gripping Alex's wrist and pointing at the slides. Alex just blinks at Sean and Sean grins, just the very tips of his developing teeth peeking out from pink gums. Then without further preamble, he drags Alex off beneath the slide, leaving their fathers staring after them with raised eyebrows.

"Well, our children seemed to have found playmates in each other. I think it's safe to assume we'll be here a while." Charles comments, looking at Erik.

"Yes," Erik says, crossing his arms over his chest casually.

"So, how often do you come here?"

This was utterly fluffy and pointless but I hope you guys enjoyed it.


End file.
